


Dashi and Ramune

by awkwardedgeworth



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: M/M, Retrograde Amnesia, an au where otabek didn't rescue yuri in barcelona, dw otabek will be A-OK
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-27
Updated: 2017-07-02
Packaged: 2018-11-19 19:38:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11320275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/awkwardedgeworth/pseuds/awkwardedgeworth
Summary: "I think Otabek is a good listener," Yuuri says with the utmost patience."Otabek," Yuri mimics Yuuri's tone, "Could do with replying instead of nodding like the bobble-head he is," A great spurt of blood sprays the wooden chopping board as Yuri viciously cuts the salmon into fillet steaks.Yuri's public image takes a further nose dive after he crashes into the GPF's silver medalist, leaving Otabek with amnesia and a complicated situation where he would have no one to look after him for two months. Since he's aresponsibleyoung man and shares half the blame to their collision, Yuri takes it upon himself to take care of Otabek until his coach returns to Almaty.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> self beta'd

"Do your best."

If Yuri were to tell his fifteen year old self that the next two years would only give him bronze and the occasional silver, he'd stomp around and throw his phone on the rink floor, yelling bullshit and demanding the real truth.

Unfortunately, that's the reality he's facing right now.

Yuri ignores Victor's useless pep talk and rips the guards off his skates, marching towards the rink and listening as the announcer counts down the five minute warm up for men's singles. His earlier clash with JJ at the hotel has blown his phone up, busybodies eating up lies fed by JJ's rabid fans. To add to his embarrassing season of constant bronze and exactly one (1) silver, the front page of every gossip site is fueling the fire by advertising the incident with JJ and taking his side.

He whizzes past the first group of competitors: Jackass; Grim Reaper; Tweety; USA; Hamtaro and last but not least....

He actually doesn't have a good nickname for Otabek Altin. Yuri, in the past, had considered calling him Resting-Bitch-Face but it's too long. Punk isn't right and he doesn't know if Asshole would suffice. He could make a statement about his height, but it will be a long time before Yuri dares pick a fight with someone whose arms and legs look like tree trunks—

"—YURI!"

Victor's screaming snaps him out of his thoughts just in time to see a blur of dark green before there's an amazing face splitting pain on his right cheekbone, something heavy ramming into his shoulder, knocking him down.

"—RI! YURI!" The world sharpens within a few blinks, and he recognizes the announcer panicking, ordering all skaters off the ice. Yakov's distinct yells are directing the first aid medics towards the entrance of the rink. Yuri sees the Russian flag draped above him, the ends fluttering next to Italy and Japan before pushing through the head splitting pain to move his head, Otabek lying too still on the ice, chin, mouth and neck red.

Then the medics swarm down upon him and he loses sight of Otabek.

Victor rides with him in the ambulance to the hospital, where he tearfully stays by Yuri's side in the ER while some porters wheel him to get an MRI and CT scan.

"What happened to Altin?" Yuri rasps as he lies back on the stretcher, allowing the doctor to clean up his cut and apply some salve to speed the bruising process. She leaves with two ice packs before telling them that a neurologist will come by very shortly with his scans.

Victor urgently says, "How are you feeling?"

"I asked about Altin," He hisses, swatting Victor's hands away when he tries to sit up, only to be pushed down. He's attracting too much attention from the nurses, still dressed in his skating costume, feathers and glittery epaulets adorning his shoulders. He's already in so much shit, he knows it. First JJ and now he colliding with Kazakhstan's best skater. 

The least Victor could do is tell him that Altin is somewhere in the ER, awake and walking.

" _Victor_."

His coach sighs before handing him his phone. Yuri immediately goes on twitter and sees a ten second playback of him and Otabek Altin whizzing towards each other at high speeds, facing in the opposite direction before Otabek turns his head in preparation for a jump and collides with him. 

It's been retweeted more than nine thousand times.

"Fuck," He sighs.

"Not quite, young man," A doctor walks towards him, wearing a pair of light blue scrubs under her coat. She nods to Victor before sitting down on a stool and wheeling herself closer, spreading his scans on his blankets. "I'm your neurologist. There's nothing wrong with your MRI or CT, and you passed the neurological exams my resident did on you when you first got here. Now, there might be signs of a concussion after we release you, but for now, you look in good health to me. Is there anyone at home who can keep an eye on you for twenty-four hours?"

"I'm his coach," Victor offers, "I'll stay with him tonight."

"That'll be ideal, thank you," She hands him a sheet of paper, "These are concussion symptoms that I need you to watch out for. If Yuri exhibits any of these before the twenty-four hours is up, please bring him back here for further treatment," She smiles at him and pats his hand. "Other than that, have a good day, gentlemen."

With his release papers signed and filed away, the ideal thing to do would be to go back to his hotel and change. He could drop by the rink afterwards and continue watching the competition as a spectator now that he forfeited his chance of bronze, but he walks around the ER, deaf to Victor's inquiries as to where he's going before finding a familiar flash of blue and yellow.

"Yuri?" Victor asks, stopping behind him.

"Get me a cup of coffee would you?"

Victor presses his mouth in one thin line, glancing past his shoulder to see Otabek and his coach several feet away from them. He hesitantly nods at the clear exhaustion and whatever blood is left on Yuri's face before leaving with a sweep of his coat.

An older looking doctor is sweating as she props Otabek's MRI and CT scans on the light box above Otabek's bed, using a pen to point to one particular picture. Denis looks worried, a hand on Otabek's forearm. The doctor's speech cuts midway and she turns to him.

Then Denis turns around, blinking.

"I'm...I'm sorry," He apologizes to Coach Denis's sneaker clad feet, standing in front of Otabek's bed. The doctor catches Otabek's attention and asks him to raise his arms forward and sideways. "Is he alright?"

Coach Denis is a fairly jolly, polite man whom Yuri had never talked to in his life until recently. Under the summer tan and Team Kazakhstan jersey, he's sweating, "He lost consciousness for around three minutes on the way here. The neurologist thinks his brain has been hit hard."

In layman terms, they don't know how bad Otabek is. Yuri stands in a pair of hospital slippers, holding his skates in one hand as he takes deep breaths to prevent his already rising panic from surfacing. He collided with the silver medalist of this year's Grand Prix Final, as well as the bronze medalist in last year's Olympics.

Fantastic. He might just have murdered Otabek's career in his host country no less. The skating world is going to lose all of their collective sensibilities.

The doctor sighs and tucks Otabek's arms back beneath the blankets, pushing his shoulders back into the bed. She turns to them, looking at Yuri from above her glasses and switching to Russian, "You are?"

"A fellow skater," She can probably guess who he is from the hideous purple egg on his cheek.

She nods and sighs, patting Altin's hospital chart, "Good news and bad news for this one here. Good news is that all of his motor skills are in place and he'll likely make a full recovery after some bed rest and no exercises in the next few days. He doesn't seem to have signs of concussion."

"And the bad news?" Coach Denis whispers.

"The bad news," The doctor sighs, turning back to Altin, who's picking at the thin hospital blankets, "Is that he doesn't remember what happened before the collision," She looks up, pushing her glasses back up on her nose. "Retrograde amnesia from physical trauma won't make him forget how to skate," She nods at the black skates Yuri is holding, "But it may affect his memories and I don't know how far back the gap is. You can try asking him questions to see."

"This—This is reversible right? He'll get his memory back?"

"His memories can come back yes, but to give you an approximate time of when it'll resurface...it's hard to say. Patients can recover through a stimulus, but I don't suggest forcibly exposing him to things he would remember. It'll have to be through a natural occurrence."

She continues on about possible treatments, voice fading in the background as Yuri turns all of his focus on Otabek, whose nose is set by a splint. Yuri, dazed, takes a few steps forward and sits on the stool closest to Otabek, lowering his skates by their laces until the blade meets the floor.

Altin flits his eyes up at the noise and blinks at him, giving him a puzzled look as the corner of his lips tug up, unsure.

Yuri spots a fleck of dried blood that they forgot to wipe, brown and flaking against Otabek's dark skin.

"Did you fall too?" Smooth and clear. His voice paints Yuri's ears with soothing greens.

"Fall?"

Otabek nods slowly, pronouncing everything is perfect Russian, "Your cheek is bruised. It looks like it hurts."

"...It does."

"I hope you'll feel better soon."

His expression is so earnest and kind that Yuri feels sick to his stomach. Otabek's smile slips off as he shoots to his feet, banging his ankle into a cabinet holding some expensive hospital machine. 

"—can't be here for him. It's an urgent family matter and I've already booked the ticket overseas."

"Does he have relatives then? Cousins? Aunts or uncles?"

"I'll take care of him."

Denis turns to him, shock written in every line of his forehead. _Clearly_ he didn't expect Yuri to volunteer, and he has a point: it wasn't as if Yuri and Otabek are friends, "You will?"

Yuri doesn't pretend that he hasn't been eavesdropping on their conversation, straightening his back as he towers over three of them, flicking his braid back behind his shoulder, "You need someone to watch him for two months while you go overseas. I'm training in Hasetsu, a quiet seaside town where all the locals know each other. Victor and Yuuri are my coaches, Otabek can attempt whatever rehab exercises the doctor insists on in the rink under their supervision. He can board in Katsuki's onsen like I am. He'll be safe." 

 

The sky is pink and purple when Yuri opens the passenger door and untangles his limbs one by one, first starting with his legs as the bones snap into place and ending with rolling his shoulders back. He wonders if Victor's going senile— he's the tallest one out of all of them and insists on a little cute hatchback. Where is the logic? _Where is the leg room?_

"Here we are," Yuri says to Otabek, who's looking around the front yard of Yu-topia Katsuki. Yuri lets him take it all in, lifting the trunk as Yuuri runs inside the entrance to prepare slippers and restrain an excited Makkachin from tackling Otabek down. "I'll lead you to your room and after dinner you can take a soak in the hot springs, how's that sound? The steam will be good for your nose."

One thing he learned right after the plane took off was that Otabek is a man of few words. Very few. Nearly scarce. He only spoke one sentence the entire way from Almaty to Narita and it was to ask Yuri to move his legs so he could go to the bathroom.

He was about to switch Otabek's chopsticks for a fork and spoon when the man himself accepts the katsudon with a smile from Hiroko, digging in.

Yuri ignores the local's amusement of another good looking foreigner staying over and slides a sheet to Otabek, turning his attention away from the late night news, "This is the practice plan from your coach. He told you he'll be gone for two months right?"

Otabek nods.

"Right," Yuri says, mouth already dry from trying to fill in the silences. He's not used to being the one who talks all day long. That spot is specially reserved for Victor and Tweety, who never shuts up, even during showers. "I'll be starting off-season training tomorrow, and if you feel up to it, you can come jog with me and I'll show you around town. If you sleep in from jet lag, that's also fine. Just look for Hiroko and she'll give you breakfast in this room, okay? The rest of us will be awake by nine the latest, and we can go together as a group to the rink."

Otabek nods again like a bobble-head. Maybe that should be his nickname.

Yuri barely gets a wink of sleep that night, listening to any peep from the room next to his. If Otabek suddenly sleep-walks into the garden and falls into the koi pond and drowns, he needs to be awake and ready to fish him out. After all, Coach Denis has put Otabek under his care and had quietly threatened Yuri at the airport to bring Kazakhstan's dear skater in one piece. Or else.

" _Otabek is also nineteen and an adult who can take care of himself_ ," Mila reminds him during their daily call. He can hear her juicer going in the background. Yuri is doing his second jog of the day, an afternoon run to warm his muscles before his second on-ice session. Otabek had joined him for the morning one before falling asleep on the benches in the rink. Yuuri is with him right now, watching and protecting him from the triplet's DSLR as Victor's and Minami's hair prances ahead of Yuri.

"Yea but I still feel bad!" 

" _I know, sweetie. You're doing a good favor for him_."

"Thanks," Yuri mumbles, recalling the small nod of approval he got from all the coaches and skaters at the press conference after Worlds. The general public seemed to be pleasantly surprised that Yuri owned up to his share of his mistake and is going this far to help out his fellow skater.

The juicer stops, " _Only for two months right?_ "

Yuri spots the rink up ahead and overtakes Victor and Minami, taking the stairs three at a time and entering the blissfully air conditioned rink, making his way past the double doors, "Yeah, Denis has to fly overseas for some family business. The plan is that Otabek would be comfortable enough by mid June to resume skating so when they reunite back in Almaty they can prepare for next season."

Mila makes a disgruntled noise, " _Sounds like a gamble_."

"He seems to be pretty okay, just quiet. Not sure if that's the way he normally is or if he's uncomfortable," His shorts is traded for a pair of leggings, a pair of gloves going over his fingers as he quickly laces up and stretches his quads out while Victor stumbles in like a fish out of water, sweaty and pink. "Talk to you later?"

" _Yeah, I have to run now anyways, tell Victor I said hello!_ "

"Yurio!" Yuuri waves from the middle of the ice, where Otabek is standing motionless, "Over here!"

"What is it?" He says when he stops in front of them, spraying ice on Yuuri's black skates. Otabek's hair lies mussed and droops over his forehead without the gel, prominent purple half-moons under his eyes from his broken nose and jet-lag.

Yuuri's Russian is still not as sub-par as he would like it to be, and Otabek, already swaying from the time difference, seems to have trouble discerning his thick accent if they switch over to English when explaining general skating concepts, so Yuuri was waiting until either Yuri or Victor came back to translate.

"Have you even been practicing on your Duolingo?" He's leading a stiff Otabek by both hands, skating backwards as Otabek copies him, only forward. After spending a sleepless night watching Otabek's most recent program and memorizing the footwork, he's now leading him through it without jumps or spins. After a while, he releases his hands and gives Otabek ample room to freely move.

Yuuri follows them from behind, holding the small external stereo that's playing Otabek's free program piece as Victor plays the top 40 hits on the rink's stereo system to warm Minami up. Yuuri is sulking, "Of course I am!"

Even though his arms are up, ready to steady Otabek if he falters or stumbles, there was no need for it. Every push of his footwork leads to a movement, not a single step wasted. The program's base scores isn't as high as Yuri's or JJ's, but the footwork is amazing. Even Minami is watching them, awed as Otabek finally relaxes and closes his eyes, entering a serpentine, the twitches in his arms becoming flowing movements that compliment the music.

Yuri dampens the irate flare of jealousy of how easily Otabek moves on the ice, truly free. He records today's success and instructs Otabek to listen to the list of potential songs for next season Denis had sent over. Every once in a while, Yuri looks up to watch him sitting quietly, headphones over his ears with a look of absolute concentration.

 

One of the triplets had posted an HD video of Otabek going through the step sequence, Yuuri and Yuri skating near him. The fans were excited; it seemed that the Kazakh champion's career was still golden.

Yuri supposes they get along well enough, on and off ice included. He's never interacted with Otabek before, excluding the rare times they pose on the podium together and sit next to each other in conferences. Christophe calls him a slippery fish, because that's exactly what Otabek does at banquets. He's there one minute, and the next minute, he's slipped out of the room, taking pictures of whichever city is hosting the competition and dodging fangirls with a skill Yuri wants to desperately learn.

Coach Denis's wishes were easily fulfilled by the end of his second week in Hasetsu. Otabek has moved from step sequences to nailing all the jumps on his roster. His spins could do some work, but Yuri can't talk. He's gone from prime champion to someone who can't stick a landing.

He hates growing.

But asides from skating, Denis had firmly instructed Otabek over Skype to enjoy himself at Hasetsu, switching between urging and pleading with him to relax and not touch Sibelius and Reaper, whatever they are.

"Do you want one?"

The weather was still cold for mid April, and the locals were giving them alarmed looks in their jackets. What they don't know is that Yuri and Otabek had ran up the stairs of the nearby shrine seven times, cheeks pink when Mari had called Yuri and asked if he could pick up some daikon for the dinner time crowd.

Yuri waves the croquettes in front of Otabek's face, "Hello?"

"Sure," Otabek takes one of the two potato croquettes. Immune to the burning piece of fried potato, he calmly eats it as Yuri burns his tongue immediately, eyes watering as they hurry back towards the onsen with heavy bags of vegetables.

One morning, he gives Katsudon an unimpressed look as they prepare breakfast.

"I'm not stupid, I know you're hoping we become best friends, braiding each other's hair and having sleepovers in each other's room."

"Well," Yuuri replies in a mothering tone, rapidly chopping onions as Yuri cuts some rabbit-eared apples with a large butcher's knife not mean for fruit cutting. "He seems to get along fine with you, and you're both close in age."

"He's closer in age with Tweety than I am with him," He's not sulking. He's definitely not sulking.

"What's the matter?"

"Feels like every single time I talk it feels forced," Yuri grumbles, setting down the knife and arranging the apples on a plate. He moves onto cracking a dozen eggs into a large bowl, adding dashi and some honey before whisking it together with a pair of chopsticks. "It doesn't help that he just nods at everything I say."

"I think Otabek is a good listener."

"Otabek," Yuri mimics Yuuri's tone, switching with Yuuri and beheading a salmon to prepare the grilled fish. "Could do with replying instead of nodding like the bobble-head he is," A great spurt of blood sprays the wooden chopping board as Yuri viciously cuts the salmon into fillet steaks.

Yuuri smiles worryingly into the rectangular frying pan, coating the surface with oil as Yuri wakes everyone up with the force of his chopping.

 

He over-rotates a triple flip and crashes down, skidding on the ice until is back bumps into the sides of the rink.

A couple of feet away, Victor gives him a slow, encouraging smile. The corner of his mouth is twitching.

 

 

 

Yuri answers this by huffily ending the day's practice and going to his corner to sulk and stretch. Minami also gets dismissed (on a good note that his quad combos are coming along beautifully) and shoots him a nervous look every few seconds like Yuri will explode and lava will coat every surface in a one meter radius.

In the kitchen, he furiously chops vegetables to help Mari with the dinner crowd, first cutting the daikon, then grabbing a crate of crab from the delivery man from the front of the onsen and preparing a marinade for them. Otabek is quietly stirring the dashi broth, a constant presence of calm and focus as he diligently takes stirring seriously.

Much later after Yuri finishes wiping each table top clean, he sits on the porch and presses his back against the cool wood, browsing through his phone. He'll take a bath later after everyone finishes and there's only soap and occasional bucket to see his eyes prickling with frustrated tears.

"I was like that when I grew three inches," A voice says, soft and the exact hue of green that's comforting.

Yuri moves his phone aside and sees Otabek standing above him, offering a bottle of ramune. Yuri mumbles and thanks and physically slides away and pats the wood so Otabek would take the hint. If he didn't, Otabek would have slowly backed away.

"I shot up half a foot overnight," Yuri looks at his knees, the pale scar tissue almost glowing in the moonlight. They look like lightning bolts from certain angles. "How much do you don't remember?"

It's a question he's been dying to ask Otabek.

"The last thing I remember was seeing you."

Yuri swivels his head, confused, "You remember us crashing into each other? You don't have amnesia then."

"Ah, that's not what I meant," Otabek says, looking up at the moon and taking a sip of his soda, "We met seven years ago at Yakov's summer camp, I'm guessing you don't remember."

Yuri looks back down, trying to remember if he ever saw Otabek. He'd been to many summer camps...and they all start to turn into one fuzzy memory....

"It's alright if you don't remember," Otabek continues on. " _Yuri Plisetsky had the eyes of a soldier_ , was what I thought back then. Perhaps you'll remember if I tell you that I was brought down to the novice class because I couldn't keep up with the skaters my age?"

"You're him!" Yuri says, pointing a finger at Otabek's amused expression. From inside the house, Mari yells at him to shut up and Yuri hastily lowers his arm. He remembers an angry twelve year old scowling as he flops his first and second position.

He didn't realize he said the last part out loud until Otabek shoots him a flat look, "I didn't take ballet after that."

"Eh? Why?"

"There's no right way to skate. Why force myself into someone I'm not when I can be exactly who I am and win that way?" Otabek shoots him a boyish grin, an arm extended behind him as the other is on propped up on his knee. A few seconds pass and he turns worried, "Yuri, are you okay? You're not breathing."

Yuri gasps for air and clutches his foot, "Cramp!"

Otabek extends a hand, concern all over his eyebrows, but Yuri bolts for his room immediately, shutting the door behind him. He dives for his futon. No way no way no way no wa—

_PRAY 4 ME_ , he frantically texts Mila, hoping that she's on her break right now, _GIVE ME UR CONDOLENCES._

_What's gotten into you?_

_IS IT JUST ME OR IS OTABEK REALLY ATTRACTIVE?_

" _Oh, Yurochka_ ," Mila sighs when he picks up her call, affection clear in her voice. " _You're about two years behind_."


	2. Chapter 2

"Did you know," He says as he exits the house earlier than usual for his morning jog, nodding at one grandma putting her recycling out, "That if you try to suffocate yourself with a pillow you'll black out and your autonomic nervous system kick starts your breathing back?" The wonders of the human body! Yuri should file this information away when one of the triplets threaten to stop breathing just so they can take a picture of him for their social media purposes.

" _I didn't expect your love to spiral down this quickly_ ," Mila replies calmly, scraping what sounds like either jam or an avocado spread on her toast. She's eating a midnight snack; St. Petersburg is six hours behind Hasetsu. " _Most people don't go for that route you know? Usually, people start with downloading all available pictures of Otabek and sighing through them all._ "

"Sounds like you're speaking from experience."

" _You didn't deny it when I said love_."

"I'm going to deny it now! We've only had one conversation!" Yuri says, going up a set of steps and pushing through the stitch at his side as he starts jogging down the easy slope that will lead him towards the bridge where most of the fishermen gather before leaving for the docks. 

Besides, he has no time for stupid feelings like this. He doesn't have time to pursue time-consuming things like dating when he has to redeem himself— a season of bronze and silver....

" _Here's what you should do_ ," She teases him, cutting off his train of thought. " _Go follow his fanclub on twitter and join the masses. Also, you should look into this magazine spread he did last year—_ "

"YOU'RE THE WORST!" Yuri yells at the top of his lungs, the seagulls sleeping on the sand waking up with a start.

When he comes back to the onsen after plucking all of the seagull feathers from his hair and shoving his head under the showers, Hiroko and Toshiya are already cooking up a storm behind the counter.

"Good morning, Yurio!" Hiroko beams at him as she skips and slides a plate of lychees towards him. Toshiya yells hello as he shakes the wok pan vigorously, steam fogging up his glasses. "Breakfast will be ready soon, in the meanwhile, eat this!"

Yuri can smell katsudon prepared from a mile away, "Are we celebrating something?" His birthday had passed a long time ago, and Yuuri's and Victor's birthdays are later in the year. Was it Mari's birthday? Or is Golden Week a cause for katsudon?

"They insisted on making it when I told them that I'm taking my cast off," Otabek says as he slides down and wiggles his leg below the low setting table, knocking his knees against Yuri's. His cast is indeed off, though the skin of his nose still red and angry looking. Hiroko passes him a bowl of hot water and motions that he should breathe in the steam before leaving with a pat on his elbow.

"Does the steam help?" Yuri is a master of casual talk. He can do this. As far as he's concerned, he's only attracted to Otabek's stupidly flawless face. He's not completely gone to the deep end yet.

"I heard it has beauty benefits!" Victor sings and squishes Yuri against the window, obnoxious as always. Yuri pinches his thigh under the table in revenge.

Otabek deadpans, "Yes, it also reduces the size of my pores." His tone is so terrifically flat that Yuri almost chokes out a laugh.  _Almost_.

"I heard you're working on a degree, Otabek," Yuuri conversationally starts once everyone is seated, sipping miso soup as Yuri attacks his smoked mackerel with vigor. Mari is sitting with her parents a table away, tutting at J.League as the TV recaps the match last night.

"Ah that's...not correct," Yuri can imagine Phichit gasping scandalously when he gets words of this news; he's the one who told them that Otabek was rumored to be studying in his home country in the first place, and that leaving for Hasetsu was going to make his summer semester difficult, "I wanted to take sports medicine but none of the courses were offered online." 

"So you're not a student?"

"I'm an athlete," Otabek easily states, "Training comes first."

"Amen," Yuri says, slamming down his empty bowl.

Yuuri looks scandalized, ready to turn to Victor for back up since Yuri had been refusing to touch university applications, but sighing once he realizes that he's outnumbered three to one on this matter. Victor pats his hand while Yuri gleefully steals Yuuri's mackerel.

Otabek, looking like he could win the Iron-man Triathlon without breaking a sweat, is a poor loser when it comes to long-distance running.

Because Yuri likes playing with fire, he takes his sweet old time jogging backwards, plastering a wide grin as Otabek's cheeks slowly becomes darker and darker. Yuuri and Victor are little ants at the bottom of the hill, waving their clipboards at them to stop fooling around.

"Didn't think your stamina sucked this bad."

Otabek sounds like he's considering pushing Yuri off the hill and to his demise, "I never liked running. Especially running outside."

"Yeah I can tell," Yuri chooses to scowl at the state of his arms and not drool. He should take a picture and sell it online. Maybe it'll pay for his rink fees. "You're a brute."

Otabek snorts, tipping his head up in a laugh, "Jealous, Plisetsky?"

Yuri swallows down a snarky comeback when Otabek's nose decides to gush out blood like a faucet, red dripping down his mouth.

Needless to say, they start running back down the hill.

As Otabek continues to bleed, already depleting half a toilet roll as he awkwardly sits cross-legged in the breakfast area, being fussed over by Hiroko, Yuri is frantically searching the emergency contact information that Denis had given to him. While he does that, Yuuri and Victor are panicking over googling nose bleed remedies.

He decides to call Zarina ("This is his sister, she's overseas in England right now," Denis had told him), waiting for the call to go through as he hovers in the genkan and switches between biting his lip and checking to make sure that Otabek is still breathing.

" _Salem?_ " A female greets.

Yuri blanches, he can speak English, Russian and conversational Japanese but Kazakh is not one of the languages he spouts. To make it all worse, he answers with an intelligent, "Uh..."

" _Ah! You must be Yuri_ ," The person exclaims over the phone, immediately switching to Russian. " _Is there something I can help you with?_ "

"Yeah— Yeah," He looks over at Otabek, who now has depleted three fourths of the toilet roll. His blood is bright red against the white tissue. "Otabek was running with me and he spontaneously got a nosebleed. Do you have his doctor's phone number—"

" _Doctor?_ " Zarina muses, " _His doctor is probably sleeping in Almaty, but I'm a neurologist in fellowship training, will that do?_ "

Yuri whips his head and glares at Otabek. He mouths,  _you never told me your sister is a doctor!_

Otabek shrugs.

" _Hello?_ " Zarina hums.

"Yes!" Yuri yells, "His nose bleed isn't stopping and I'm worried that it might be because of his head...?"

" _Don't worry about it, Beka gets nosebleeds easily in the hot weather. Best to keep him indoors where it's relatively cool. The bleeding will stop eventually, don't tell him to tilt his head up—_ " Yuri smacks Victor's hand away as he tries to do exactly as Zarina told him not to do, "— _How is he recovering, by the way?_ "

"Good," Yuri says, watching Otabek pull out the tissue to pat his nose. His hand isn't bloody. "Do you want to talk to him?"

Otabek mostly listens as he sits there with a resigned look of someone being lectured. Yuri can relate to this as he cleans up, spraying diluted alcohol where some blood had dripped onto the table's surface. The siblings share a few words before hanging up.

Yuri crosses his arms expectantly.

"I told you I don't like running outside," Otabek says, quickly crab-walking backwards as Yuri chases after him with a spray bottle. In the background, he can hear Hiroko coo over how well they get along, "Okay! Okay! I'm sorry!"

"Tell us that before you lose a pint of blood, asshole!"

 

"He looks adorable," Victor remarks as Yuri skates towards his water bottle, squirting it in his mouth as he shoots an irritated glance towards the sides. "Look at him playing with his hands! Like a ferret! Or raccoon!"

"How are you even  _married?_ " Yuri grumbles under his breath, not impressed by the puppy eyes Otabek is shooting towards him.

"Aw, but look! He's holding ramune! And your favorite flavor too!"

"I will not be bought over by bribery," He pointedly digs his toe pick into the fleshy part of Victor's leg, "Now get on with it! I need to nail my quad salchow-triple toe combo!"

Victor says something about how cute Yuri was when he was still fifteen and less angry. Yuri kicks him in response.

Out of curiosity, he texts Zarina's number after practice one night.

_This is Yuri again_ , he taps,  _how long does Otabek tend to feel guilt?_

_I once made him do all of my chores for an entire year because I fell on the ice and he laughed_.

His phone beeps with another text,  _He's a good kid, really, very soft-hearted even though he doesn't look like it. Did something happen?_

_Bloody nose thing, he didn't tell us that before Victor made us run laps outside in the heat._

He can see the tiny bubble pop up, meaning that Zarina is typing her reply. With a sudden stroke of courage and recklessness, he adds,  _I also want to help Otabek gain his memories faster. The doctor he saw when he first came to the hospital said that if he listens to previous music he likes he might be able to get it back. So. The music Otabek likes. Do you know any?_

Zarina abruptly stops typing and Yuri wonders if he was too obvious.

_You should ask him yourself and be prepared to be disappointed. I thought my brother had sensible music tastes but apparently not._

???? Yuri types, but Zarina doesn't reply after that.

Cautiously, he saunters up to Otabek the next morning and skates along side him as they warm up with compulsories, "I've been doing some research," He starts, Otabek cocking his head at him as Minami shoots ahead of them to do counters, "It says that if you listen to old music you once like you have a greater chance of getting your memories back."

"That's what Denis said too," He gestures to the one lone ear bud in his right ear and pulls out an old iPod shuffle from his pocket, "He took me home and found this for me in my room. This contains the music from around the same time I have a gap in my memories," Otabek wrinkles his nose, "I forgot I had a Linkin Park phase."

Yuri laughs at that, "No way!"

"Yes way," Otabek seriously says. "'Twas a dark time."

"What's your favorite song from there?"

Otabek gives one earbud to Yuri.

He closes his eyes, of course it would be Beethoven—

"Is this...Kanye West's Gold Digger mashed up with Beethoven's 9th?" He asks incredulously, amazed at how well the two songs combine. He hears gold popping here and there, mingling among deep bronze of the electronic beat. A wide grin makes itself known as he looks up to Otabek's face. 

"Cool, right?" Otabek offers, smiling they're amidst a field of daisies and not a cold rink.

"Okay, you're forgiven," Yuri quickly says, skating off with Otabek's phone as Victor orders them to start their spirals and spread-eagles.

He spends the next hour trying to contain the mental screaming in his head, not even bothered when he pops out of a triple axel.

This can be a little game, a mini path down memory lane. He just needs to get through the next month as if this was his last season, persevere through Otabek like he had persevered through his aching joints and the swoop of his stomach when his scores don't come near his personal best. If he survived a season of bronze and silvers, he can endure this.

But the thing is, Otabek, who was nothing more than a hurdle Yuri saw from a distance, something to jump over and beat on his way to Olympic gold and title of World Champion, turned into a person with depth and layers. Yuri finds himself looking forward to seeing Otabek on their morning runs, stretching together side by side to prep for their on-ice sessions, listening to old music, laughing when Otabek glares zealously at the ease Yuri has in popping into a biellmann. He's come to understand the different smiles Otabek has on his face, the feel of his hands when he helps him bend further into a stretch, both of them sharing a mutual understanding of what they have to give up to be the best.

He's turned into a multifaceted diamond and Yuri can't look away.

 

Phichit visits in the middle of May, marking Otabek's last month in Hasetsu.

Yuri comes home from the rink with a tickle in his throat, Otabek trailing behind him as both of them massage the bruises on their hips. Victor had started teaching them the quad flip side by side, and Yuri feels a little better that both Minami and Otabek are also struggling.

"I'm only here for a week," Phichit says to everyone as they move two large tables together. Earlier, they had helped Phichit distribute some pineapple cakes from Taoyuan airport, Otabek eagerly recognizing the packaging and recalling a fond memory of getting stranded there during his junior years with Leo and Guang Hong. The entire table is covered in a good spread of food, and Yuri salivates over the katsudon, relishing the crunchy pork as his meals lately consisted of bland, boiled chicken and greens. "Victor promised me an exhibition program and Yuuri's finally going to show me around Hasetsu!"

"You're just in time for the local festivals," Mari says, offering her younger brother a plate of greens. Her voice comes off as a pale, pleasant purple, "Yuuri, you should lend Phichit one of the onsen's yukatas and make a night out of it."

"Oh, that's a good idea!" Yuuri says, nodding. 

Phichit gasps, "I can make a vlog out of it!" And then to his horror, Phichit turns to Yuri, starry-eyed, "You and Otabek can come too! Let's all wear yukatas!" Anyone in the room can see Phichit mentally calculating twitter and instagram statistics; the fans would go wild.

"You started vlogging?" Yuuri asks, faint.

"YES! I have over seventy thousand followers already! Do you remember those skits we would do with Celestino back in Detroit? I posted some of them up and they're all the rage! Everyone loves you, Yuuri!"

_Whump_.

Victor runs to get the smelling salts, and Yuri steals Yuuri's katsudon. That just about sums up dinnertime.

 

"Did Victor suffer from his growth spurt like you did?"

Yuri doesn't bother opening his eyes, sliding deeper into the hot springs as the telltale green in his ears alerts him that Otabek is about to enter the water. From his voice, he must be a few feet away from where Yuri is sitting.

"Of course not," Comes his reply. "Victor only started growing when he's sixteen," And his growth was so microscopic that Yuri didn't even notice that he grew taller until Yakov started to measure him on a monthly basis, the faded pencil markings on his office wall steadily climbing.

"So you're getting advice from someone who's growth spurt didn't affect them that much."

Yuri's eyes snaps open.

"You have a point, continue," He orders Otabek.

"When we skate tomorrow, I'll help you. Maybe it'll offer some insight Victor can't relate to."

"Deal."

When Otabek leaves the hot springs, Yuri stays behind for an extra half hour, the heat soothing his spent muscles. He dreams of the day when his knees stops bitching at him whenever he falls out of a quad-triple combination, remembering how well his body use to respond to him two years ago.

He's thirsty, so he goes to the kitchen for a glass of milk before retiring to his bedroom when he spots Phichit and Otabek sitting next to each other, shoulders touching, clearly chummy.

"Yuri!" Phichit whispers loudly, waving him over with a big smile like he isn't dead from travelling and reviving Yuuri with smelling salts earlier.

Yuri walks over with a glass of milk in hand and a ramune for Phichit, who oohs and aahs at the marble contraption. Otabek has one ear covered with a heavy duty headphone, face lit up from Phichit's laptop screen.

"Is that your vlog?" Yuri asks, unsure if he's allowed to peek at the screen or not. Otabek angles the laptop to let Yuri look at a clip of Phichit getting ice-cream with a pair of American ice dancers. He's sure that they have a youtube channel as well...was it called ShibShibs? ShibSibs?

Phichit takes a sip of the lemon-lime drink, nodding, "It is! I asked if I could use one of Otabek's tracks as the background music. He's looking over it now. Has he told you about his musical talents?"

"It's just a hobby," Otabek mumbles, pushing the laptop back to Phichit.

"Nonsense!"

"I thought you just DJ?" Yuri asks. He's been listening to Welcome To The Madness these days, feeling a spiritual connection to the lyrics.

Otabek tries to wave Phichit off but gets his mouth covered by his hand instead, "Otabek also makes his own music! He has a synth back at home where he'd play the parts individually before mixing them together. Guess how many followers he has!"

"How many followers do you have on SoundCloud?" Yuri parrots.

"A few," Otabek says at the same time Phichit yells, "Two hundred thousand!"

"So humble," Yuri teases as Otabek groans and shakes Phichit off. He grumbles something about going to bed, biding both of them good night before sulking to his bedroom down the hall, rubbing the stubble on his chin.

Phichit laughs quietly as he saves his video, "He's shy whenever we tell him all the great things he does. Took him two years to stop blushing over the  _Hero of Kazakhstan_  title."

"You know a lot about him," Yuri says suspiciously. 

Phichit smiles at him for a minute, before relaxing, "Yuri, I have no feelings for Otabek."

The milk goes down the wrong pipe and he chokes, Phichit yelping as he runs to grab some water from the kitchen. Eventually, the heat in his cheeks dissipates and he's able to sit still without coughing.

Phichit has his chin in his hands, giving Yuri an encouraging nod, "Like I said earlier, I have no feelings for Otabek so you don't need to glare at me."

"I—I didn't glare at you," Yuri splutters. "I'm sorry?"

Their voices are hushed, the only light coming from the lone floor lamp in the corner. Yuri can still hear some of their guests shuffling around in their rooms, but other than that, it's very quiet. Phichit traces designs on the bottle's label with his pinky.

He doesn't know why he's spilling off his deepest darkest secret to the man Buzzfeed coined,  _King of Social Media_ , "I guess I do like him...sort of."

He tacks that to the end of his sentences, hoping to sound aloof, giving Phichit an air that's not at all inconvenienced by this entire thing with love, his shit hormones, and Otabek's steady presence at his side.

Perhaps what makes Phichit so loved by everyone is that he understands people.

"You don't know how to act around him now," Phichit takes a shot in the dark, giving Yuri a sympathetic smile when he hits home. "Well, it's entirely up to you, Yuri. You can do anything you want. Ideally, what would you want to happen?"

Yuri shrugs, "I haven't thought much about it. Otabek's going to leave in a few weeks to go back to Almaty. I'll be here year-round unless Victor wants to move back to St. Petersburg. If we do end up together, we can only see each other if we're shuffled into the same competitions," There's the cost of flights both of them have to consider, working around competition schedules since Yuri will be tied up for Euro Championships while Otabek has Four Continents. "There's time zones to think about as well."

It's easy right now because Otabek is next to him. 

"Sounds like you've given this a lot of thought." 

Yuri scowls at Phichit across the table, swiping his empty ramune bottle and taking it in the kitchen to be recycled, "You get what I mean. I only like him now since he's close by and I can talk to him whenever I want."

"Yuri," Phichit begins in a very patient voice. Yuri has heard this tone many times when Yuuri had a series of nervous fits right before his wedding, "Let me tell you a secret."

"Okay?"

"In life, you're continuously making and breaking friendships with people around you. There's no one person whom you can maintain a wholesome friendship with unless both parties put in the effort to make it work. It's also the same with romantic relationships. If you and Otabek want to make it work and both of you put in effort, everything will fall into place."

"Then what makes a relationship worth it?" Yuri asks, thinking about Georgi and Mila, how he had to comfort them when they were all still under Yakov. He recalls the nights where Yuuko comes to Yuuri, teary eyed over a fight she had with Nishigori, Minako cajoling her into drinking her sorrows away as she pitifully pats her back the entire night. In the end, everyone still fights.

Phichit shrugs, eyes crinkled in a soft smile as he rests one chin in a hand, "Who knows Yuri? Maybe because they're worth it?"


	3. Chapter 3

He wakes up with a sore throat and immediately gargles salt water, spitting it out in the bathroom sink before he makes way to run a lap around Hasetsu, per usual of his morning routine.

On the way home, Yuri intercepts the mailman and sees all of the large mailing stickers on a small box, covered with stamps and doodles. It's addressed to Otabek.

"Ah," The aforementioned says at breakfast, like receiving a box violently doodled with hearts and bubbly letters in Kazakh is the norm, "I've been expecting that. Zarina said she'd fly home to the family home last weekend and send over some picture albums," When Yuri raises his brow dubiously at the hearts, Otabek tells him that he has little cousins who are trying to make their mark on the world as artists.

Phichit tags along to the rink, easily chatting to Otabek as Yuri and Minami stretch side by side and talk about the sticky heat around them. Yuri mostly listens and nods at appropriate moments, studying Otabek from the corner of his eyes as he tells Phichit about Yakov's summer camp seven years ago like it happened yesterday.

When Phichit casually drops into a beautiful cambré, holding the guardrail steady, Otabek's easy going smile drops into a flat look. Yuri has taken the picture before either of them blinked, and uploads it onto twitter.

"Well, you're in for a treat," Yuuri pats Otabek's wide shoulders with both hands as he breezes through the rink doors. "Minako's coming over today and I'm sure she'll have fun looking at your forms."

Phichit has his vlog camera out and gleefully records Otabek's painful smile. He spends the next fifteen minutes talking to the camera and holding it away at arms length, asking Otabek what he's been up to in Hasetsu while Yuri does his best to avoid the camera. The world doesn't need to know how badly he's popping out of his quad flips yet.

It turns out that the second reason Phichit is here, aside from learning his exhibition program from Victor and touring Hasetsu, is so he can plan Phichit on Ice with Minako. The two have their heads bent over at one end of the rink, oblivious to the rest of the world as Otabek struggles with a biellmann spin.

Otabek motions him over during their second on-ice session and Yuri zips to him, trying not to raise his hopes up when he tells him to change the way he holds his shoulders in a quad. Maybe it will work, maybe it won't.

When Yuri lands a shaky, but solid flip, he yells and punches the air. Victor is bawling his eyes out and Yuri is so happy that he doesn't even mind being twirled around by Minami and Phichit, breaking off and stopping in front of Otabek.

"I did it!"

A fond smile, "Yes you did."

"I'm going to try again!" Yuri whisks off, not even minding that Phichit has his camera pointed at him.

 

Grandpa, once Yuri told him to press the correct camera on the iPad that a sponsorship gave him, is so proud that there's little tears in his eyes.

" _I have never doubted your abilities, Yurochka_."

Yuri preens like a very pleased songbird, puffing out his chest and nodding as Grandpa waxes about his bad knee (Yuri relates, he understands all about bad knees now) and a program he listens to on the radio every so often. In turn, Yuri tells him about Phichit and how they've all planned to go to the festival in a few day's time. 

Yuri instructs him some of the easier Japanese dishes he can make now, and tells him which ingredients to substitute since the closest Asian market in the neighbourhood is at most, lacking. Grandpa turns the camera to Potya and bids him good night after two hours. Yuri goes to sleep happy and relaxed, not a single thought about when his skating career will crash and burn around him.

In the middle of the night, he wakes up and registers a fire in this throat. This is bad, so naturally, he goes back to sleep.

When he wakes again, it's fifteen minutes before he's supposed to be at the rink, and he grabs his phone and texts Victor that he feels like Johnny Storm from Fantastic Four. He sends Mila a WeChat sound clip of him coughing before closing his eyes, rolling further into his blankets.

Sometime after the sun is directly above him, he peels his eyes open again, every muscle in his body aches even though he stretched them out the night before.

Hiroko had just finished with serving lunch and pushes him back into his room when she spots him stumbling and running into walls. Mari opens the sliding door in his room and makes him a cold compress, changing his sweat-soaked futon. They give him some porridge and Yuri lies horizontally on the tatami mats, flinging his limbs out like a starfish as a headache makes itself known.

Sitting still and resting doesn't bode well with Yuri, so he asks Mari if he can do something that doesn't require much standing or moving, and she lets him sit in the dining room, pushing a peeler and a box of vegetables at him. Yuri spends a few hours watching the TV and absent-mindedly peeling potatoes, trying to breathe out of one nose.

Hiroko keeps giving him tea with honey, and Yuri throws them back like they're water because the last thing he needs is to be ill. Maybe this is a 24 hour thing.

When everyone comes home from the rink, Yuri has gargled salt water down his throat six times and throws a middle finger at Phichit's camera.

"Rough day, huh?"

He coughs in response, shooting an evil look at everyone who's healthy, who can stand and  _breathe out of their nose like normal people can._

For some reason, Otabek's initial kindness to help Yuri solve his jumps extends to taking care of Yuri, mainly by hovering around him like a worried hen. The instructions to keep hydrating himself while encouraging him to sweat his fever out is ingrained so deeply in Yuri's brain that he'll probably take this to his grave.

"Where did you even learn all of this?" Yuri cuts Otabek off as he's explaining the homeostasis of the sodium, potassium, phosphate and chloride ion in the body. Otabek had regurgitated an entire textbook's worth of information in the thirty minutes they've sat in the onsen, Phichit humming Terra Incognita in a corner.

"My sister is a doctor," Otabek says patiently, like this isn't the third time Yuri's feverish brain has asked. "So are both my parents and the rest of my sisters."

"Is there anyone who's not a doctor in your family?"

Otabek pauses, "I'm a skater?"

Yuri laughs so much that he accidentally sinks into the hot springs and immediately gets fished out by a panicked Otabek.

"Sports medicine? You sure you don't want to do academia?"

Otabek scrunches his nose, "Do you know how hard academia is? Have you heard about the politics surrounding research?"

"No," Yuri replies as Otabek launches into a passionate rant about his sisters' experience writing their dissertations and the one time he sat next to Zarina as she ripped her hair out, screaming at her laptop. It's the same tone he uses when he grumbles about certain classical pieces that are overused, cringing at the video of his pixelated nine-year-old self skating to Nessun Dorma.

Phichit drags them to the pond in the back, and they spend the next hour scrolling through social media before Phichit slinks away to his bed, bleary-eyed and muttering something about being old. Yuri sees right through it and catches Phichit winking at him right before he enters Yu-topia.

Otabek shows him indie artists that Yuri thinks Mila will like, since she's recently asked Yakov if he knows of any music people that can put together a blend of indie songs for her next long program. 

His aching body improves the next day, and he's able to do some spins and doubles on the ice. Victor mostly keeps him to his step sequence since jumping makes Yuri feel like he's been run over by an elephant, focusing his attention to Minami and Phichit.

"What you up to?" He says when Otabek skates towards him and grabs a towel to pat his face.

"Exhibition program stuff," Otabek strips the blue and yellow warm up jacket and fans himself with his tank top. Yuri forcefully diverts his eyes away from the biceps on display, "Denis said that he'll call Victor today and talk about a short program in the works." 

"Did the albums help?" Otabek had flipped through them absent mindedly when Yuri stuck his head into his room and yelled at him to get his ass to the rink on time.

"Some? I'm starting to remember my days in Colorado with Leo," There's a thoughtful look on his face, "It's weird."

"What's weird?" Phichit slides into their conversation, out of breath.

"I'd be doing my own thing and suddenly a memory pops up," Otabek pauses, "Huh, there it is again."

"What is it this time?" Yuri asks, curious.

For some reason, Otabek coughs something about a playlist and skates away when Victor calls him. Phichit has a sunny smile on his face and giggles to his phone, texting Leo.

 

Otabek invites him to go over the photo albums together since Victor wrapped up practice early. Yuri, the good friend he is, graciously accepts. He's getting used to his heart beating out of rhythm.

They flip through pictures of Otabek's childhood, Yuri watching his sisters sprout up and giggling when he comes to a picture where Otabek is sitting on Zarina's feet, teary-eyed as she's about to leave for university. By the time the third sister has to leave for university, Otabek gives her a hug instead, his mother capturing the moment on film. The edges of those family photos are worn and rounded.

Otabek's hands are too slow to prevent Yuri from finding one of him talking to Leo and Guang Hong in their early junior days, wires running across his teeth. He looks skinny.

"You had braces!"

"Not everyone has perfect teeth," Otabek darkly grumbles, flipping the page quickly.

Then he stumbles upon Otabek and  _JJ fucking Leroy_.

"You trained with him?!" Yuri gasps, snatching the album away and peering at Otabek surrounded by the Leroys acting as his host-family in Canada. There's a large dog as well. "Tell me this is a lie and your sister is just talented with photoshop." 

"Why would I lie?" Otabek dryly asks, as Yuri continues to flip, eyes widening in horror as he sees a braces-less Otabek and Isabella standing next to each other at JJ's high school graduation, the fucker doing the JJ-style pose in the background, clearly photobombing. "JJ probably has the same pictures as I do, I know Bella does."

"My condolences."

Otabek snorts, fishing the album back and closing it. He grabs a new one, "The rest are pictures of me in a boring suit, which I'm sure there are many of floating around the internet. I have a picture I want to show you," He flips a few pages, pointing to a sulky looking boy standing next to a younger Denis.

"That's you?"

"Look in the background."

Yuri brings the album closer to his eyes and frowns. The lighting and quality isn't great in the first place, but he sees a profile of a small boy with blond, almost white hair looking off to the side, "That's me!" He whips his head up at Otabek's grin.

"Told you we were at the same summer camp."

"I didn't think you were lying, idiot," Yuri says, fond. He flips through the next few pictures and sees the pain etched on Otabek's face whenever there's a barre in the background. There's one of a young Otabek standing next to a group of boys, all wearing a school uniform, one of Otabek with a group of cousins, and one of his sisters flinging him into a lake.

The next couple of pages are empty before Yuri finds the last picture, Otabek now older and sitting on a motorcycle, throwing a casual smile at the camera. His shoulders are wider. It must be after he returned to Almaty. 

"Yuri," Yuuri knocks and sticks his head into the room, "The yukatas are ready, do you want to get dressed now?"

"Yeah, teach me how to tie the obi again," Yuri hastily says, grabbing the fabric from Yuuri's arms. He gives the one with flowy grey vines to Otabek and pulls his hair into a ponytail so it doesn't get in the way. 

The group immediately loses Phichit and Yuuri the moment Phichit puts away his camera, dragging his best friend by the wrist to play games. Victor follows Yuuri, a beacon of large forehead as he ditches Yuri and Otabek.

Yuri isn't complaining though, he points to the little booths and coerces Otabek to participate in a shooting game, where he gets his ass handed as Otabek throws two stuffed whale sharks at him. 

"How? HOW?"

"The Leroys take me shooting sometimes."

"That's so wild, I thought they're Canadian."

"You can have guns in Canada if you have a license," Otabek rolls his eyes, "If you must know, they're not covered in snow all year round either. They have houses like the rest of the world."

"I know that," Yuri lies, dragging him to a food stall and buying smoked squid. "I'm civilized."

Otabek wisely doesn't say anything, choosing to bite into his food and hold one of the whale sharks under an arm. When he catches Yuri staring at the exposed arm, sleeve rolled up, he says, "JJ has a tattoo of the maple leaf on his arm."

Yuri's answer is immediate, "Gross, don't tell me you want one."

He suddenly feels warm around the cheeks as Otabek leans close and murmurs low in his ear, "I already have one."

Yuri didn't sign up to spontaneously burst into flames when he'd told Denis he'd take care of Otabek but here is he.

Otabek fumbles with the different notes and coins as Yuri hangs back, watching him buy some yakisoba and taiyaki. Victor's booming laughter can be heard several stalls away, and Yuri hurriedly pulls Otabek in the opposite direction, wildly looking for empty benches. They have a good view of the local teens putting on a taiko show, and watch that for a few minutes as the sun continues to set, the hot weather turning balmy.

Phichit, all alone, shows up when the taiko drummers finish their set, the next group setting the stage for a dance.

"Why are you here?" Yuri asks, no venom in his voice. He cranes his head to look for Victor and Yuuri.

"They're off having fun by themselves," Phichit giggles as Otabek blanches. "I told them I'd be getting some yakitori and beer, do you want to come?"

"We're good, thanks," Otabek cuts in when Yuri's eyes gleams at the offer of alcohol. When Phichit waves and begins to walk away again, he turns to Yuri sternly, "You're under-aged here."

"You're no fun," Yuri grumps. However, he jumps to his feet when Otabek starts to leave, "Hey!"

"Sit back down, I want to buy something."

Yuri wants to go after him but his feet hurts and a crowd has started to gather, so he saves their little bench and props his new whale shark friends where Otabek had been sitting, taking a picture and playing around with the filters and lighting until it comes out decent. He uploads it immediately.

"Here you go, Your Highness."

Otabek drops two bags of crushed ice the size of pebbles into Yuri's lap as he holds a medium sized bowl of shaved ice with pudding and boba in some sweet sauce drizzled over the green and yellow snow. The whale friends are removed, and Otabek balances the dessert in his lap as he presses one of the ice packs to Yuri's knee, "I normally use heating pads for growing pains but since it's hot, I didn't think you'd appreciate it as much. At least this is cooler."

Yuri wants to kiss him.

Instead, he turns pink and ducks down, bangs acting like a curtain as he grabs the other ice pack and presses it onto his other knee.

"I didn't think Victor approved of extra desserts."

Otabek looks up, one corner tugging up in a smile as the dancers start the music, beckoning everyone to learn the steps, "I bumped into him on the way back, I have my ways. Want a bite?" He's holding up a spoonful of yellow ice, a piece of mango and pudding on top of it.

Since Yuri has taken hold of both the ice packs, he opens his mouth, expectant.

"Pineapple!" He says, swallowing. "What's green?"

"Green apple, I guess," Otabek scoops some into his mouth an eye twitching, "It's sour." He mixes the green and yellow together before spooning Yuri another bite, chewing on the small cubes of mango. They watch the locals dance around for a few minutes until Yuri's knee feels better.

One of the daughters of the mochi shop owner near the rink pops up in front of Yuri, asking him if he and his boyfriend wants to join the dance.

Otabek waits for a translation patiently, giving the girl a polite smile as he turns his head here and there.

"He's not my boyfriend," Yuri hastily tells the girl in Japanese. She squeaks and apologizes, bowing her head several times as he jumps to his feet and waves his arms around uselessly like an octopus. It's okay! Everything is fine! He's not angry!

She runs off with one last final bow and ducks her head politely at Otabek, who turns to him with an accusing arch of his eyebrow.

"Were you rude to her?"

"Excuse me?" Yuri gapes. "You thought I drove her away?"

"Well, they call you Ice Tiger for a reason right?"

"Last time I checked, I saved your career by letting you stay with me while your coach traipsed off into the unknowns," Yuri sniffs delicately, eyeing Otabek's toes to see if he can stomp on it before the other draws it away, "She asked if we wanted to join the group dance over there."

"Oh, why didn't you say so? I'm up for it if you are. Let's go," Otabek pulls him eagerly into the center of the circle, two couples on either side of them shuffling to make room and grinning widely at Yuri.

"Do you even know how to dance?"

"I had to learn square dancing when I was in high school, and of course, ballet."

Yuri snorts, holding Otabek's palm as they walk around each other in time with the music, "I'd like to see you pop an attitude in your yukata."

"Is that a challenge?"

Yuri pushes Otabek down by holding down his shoulders, "Don't you even think about it! If I give you back to Denis with broken toes he's going to be very angry with me!"

"Only slightly, he'd be more cross towards me," Otabek says, spinning Yuri around. "He hated it when I told him I'd be hanging out with my friends, I always come back more bruised."

Yuri raises a brow, "I thought you'd have...normal friends."

"They  _are_ normal, just mischievous."

"Like Junior-level-Victor-and-Georgi level of mischievous, hiding from Yakov in hotels and trying to drown each other in the rooftop pool or Senior-level-Victor-and-Chris type of mischievous, where Chris tries to cop a feel of Victor's ass in every competition?"

Otabek keeps a very level expression, "The former."

They exchange partners and Yuri blinks when Phichit twirls around him, camera swinging from a wrist strap, "You two look cozy," He says, flickering his gaze towards where Otabek and the daughter of the mochi stand are spinning. "I caught some sweet footage. I'm obviously not going to post them, but I'll send them over to you!"

Yuri can only grimace as they switch partners again, catching sight of Yuuri and Victor two couples away from them, Victor sending Yuri eye spasms that are supposed to be winks.

The announcements can barely be heard over the music, but Yuri stops, Otabek clipping his nose on Yuri's chin before looking up with a frown, "What—"

"Come on!" Yuri grabs his wrist and tugs him away from the circle, fishing whale shark one and two from the bench and dancing past the owner of the shaved ice stand with his wife, side-stepping some teenagers and three small girls who are carrying goldfishes in plastic bags, down the gentle hill of the shrine until they reach the steps where Victor forces them to do sideways stair runs. There's a little path off to the woods and Yuri slows down, listening to the announcer's voice as they emerge from a bush.

He runs to the little bridge over a small creek with a good view of the sky, "Come on, Otabek, come here!"

Otabek stretches his neck up as the first round of reds and oranges burst, shimmering in the sky as the little sparklers spiral down. A purple one shoots up in the sky, silver lights popping in the center before fading. There's blue, green, and white. A high-pitch whistle of girandola as it spirals towards the middle, red shooting out. Yuri grins, the fireworks sounding like the medal podium in his ears. 

He turns to see Otabek already looking at him.

Yuri points to the sky, where several lights of reds and greens are shooting up like comets, "Look there, not me."

Otabek considers it for a few seconds before craning his head up again, smiling to himself, shifting his weight to one foot and crossing his arms.

 

"Oh hell no," Yuri snaps, flinging the door to Otabek's room open as he sees a hideous figure hiding under a blanket, one of the whale shark stuffies balanced on top of what Yuri assumes is his head. "I thought idiots aren't supposed to get colds!"

Otabek gives him a sad sniffle.

Yuri rolls his eyes and lets Hiroko wiggle into the room, "We're going to send Phichit to the airport now. We'll be back in a couple of hours. Take your own advice and drink lots of water!"

Otabek might have laughed, but it was quickly covered as he wheezes.

The drive to Fukouka airport takes them an hour and a half, the sky seemingly sharing Phichit's sulky mood as his trip comes to an end. Yuri would have to do this trip in two weeks' time for Otabek, the thought depressing him as he puts his forehead against the window.

A helpful airport staff takes a picture of all of them, and then Phichit is waving through security, camera in hand.

Victor wheedles Yuuri to drive them to get tonkotsu ramen while they're in Fukouka. Yuri calls Mila as he mimes puking into his glass, waiting for the food to arrive. He escapes the grossness as soon as Yuuri cuts the engine to the little hatchback, running into the resort.

"Welcome back," Otabek croaks nasally as he shivers with two jerseys zipped up on top of each other. He has a Team Kazakhstan toque hiding his hair, sitting directly on the only patch of sun in the dining room.

He quickly snaps a picture as Otabek shoots him a glare, "It's nearly thirty degrees outside, you're such a hypocrite."

"I'm cold."

"And who was the one who told me to sweat my fever out?" Yuri asks, grinning from ear to ear. It's finally his turn to be the wise words of wisdom. He cackles when Otabek can only sniff at him, yelling goodbye as he joins Minami at the Ice Castle.

Otabek is deep in a heated debate with Leo when Yuri comes back. Tiny Leo waves at him, and Yuri drops down to say hi, "What were you guys doing?"

"Beka forgot that Almaty lost the bid to host the Olympics in 2022," Leo chuckles, "His reaction when I told him was exactly the same as it was three years ago."

"Ugh," Otabek supplies.

"See, still salty," Leo cheerfully says. "We were watching this year's GPF together. Otabek has  _quite_ some things to say about my fellow countrymen—"

"I don't understand why Chen stacks so many quads," Otabek feverishly rants, looking a little manic, "He has seven but falls out of his triple axel. I personally think that strength is not everything; there is footwork and many other things to be considered in a well-rounded skater—"

Yuri sulks, remembering the bronze he gave up as Chen joined Seung-gil and Phichit in Skate America, "Ugh don't talk to me about him."

"—understand that he was a former dancer and has artistic abilities that can certainly be shown on ice if he chooses to focus more on it. But wouldn't you agree with me that he should spend more time concentrating and nailing his triples instead of worrying about quads—"

"SO OTABEK," Leo cuts in before Yuri can strangle Otabek with his toque. "How's your training?"

"Good, I've been working on jumping with an arm over my head. Denis seems pleased," Otabek says, unaware of how Yuri lies on the floor with his cheek pressed to the wood, reminiscing when he was actually good at quads alongside his artistic ability. Yuri would record this, the usual soft-spoken Otabek roasting one of the newer skaters in the senior circuit in a stroke of fever-induced rant if it weren't for the fact that said child prodigy sprung out of nowhere and  _stole the bronze that clearly had Yuri's name all over it_ , "What about you? Are you still doing the flamenco?"

"The flamenco was two years ago," Leo says in a tone that Denis usually has when Otabek gets his years and memories mixed up. "I'm working on the Coldplay one, do you recall?"

"...That Lose Yourself remix?"

"No, Beka, that's Enimem," Leo fondly reminds him, "And that was your exhibition piece anyway."

Hiroko calls Yuri over to help set the table, hoisting a large pot with broth, the plates covered in uncooked meat. Otabek picks at the hot pot unenthusiastically as Yuri tries to coax the gigantic man-baby to eat some vegetables because  _they're good for you damn it_. Yuuri and Victor are doing those annoying couple things where they can speak telepathically in a loud room, punctuating their sentences with eyebrow wiggles. 

Yuri flicks a goji berry and it hits Victor square on the forehead.

Since Otabek is sixty pounds heavier than Yuri, and Yuri doesn't trust himself to catch him with the hot spring's slippery rocks, Victor sits with them as Otabek sways like a seaweed, mumbling to himself about jumps.

Yuri doesn't wait for Otabek to wake up for their morning run, choosing to go early as he runs two laps around town before the afternoon heat cooks his skin. Otabek is missing from practice, and only stumbles in later to sit at the sidelines, holding the Makkachin tissue holder like a lifeline.

"I have a fever," Otabek mumbles when Yuri steps off the ice and was about to tell him off for only wearing a t-shirt. "And I'm sane, I'm sorry if whatever I said yesterday offended you."

"You remembered?"

"No, but my family always tells me I'm hard to handle when I'm ill," Otabek passes him his water bottle, "Your flip looks more in control today, good work."

Yuri is too tired to try and figure out Otabek's cryptic messages, so he just nods and goes off to the side to prepare for his session with Minako.

What are they?

The question weighs him down, dragging on heavier and heavier as the date on Otabek's return flight to Almaty comes closer. Victor, torn between snapping at Yuri to focus and helping Otabek with his short program, finally has enough and bans Yuri from the rink until further notice. 

"Are you fucking insane?!" Yuri roars, nine more days until Otabek leaves hanging over his head like a storm cloud. Thankfully, they're walking back from the fish market. Several locals scuttle out of their way.

"Okay, I'll give you three days how about that? Sort out what you need to with Otabek before coming back to practice with a clear head."

"I hate you," Yuri announces when they arrive, slipping off his runners and stalking over to the kitchen to give Mari his bag of monkfish and eel. He ignores Otabek coming up to him in the hallway, slamming his door shut.

He falls into his futon and screams.

 

_No, no, absolute not_ , Zarina texts,  _that one looks like a death trap_.

Yuri, disgruntled, sends her another link. Hammerhead Great White Tiger is a very comfortable pillow to rest his head on.

_Can Beka's feet even reach?_

_You're vicious_ , Yuri notes.

_I'm realistic_ , Zarina offers.  _And that Ninja 400 is too tall, I know because I ride one and he can't ride it whenever he visits me._ _He prefers the Street 750 aside from the one he has back home. See if they carry it._

With Otabek's flight leaving Narita International leaving in seven days, Yuri cooks his plan into action.

"I need to borrow Otabek tomorrow," Yuri says as he glares at Yuuri in the kitchen, both of them standing side by side, washing dishes. The sink of full of soap suds that Yuri isn't afraid to use if Katsudon becomes to unbearable. "I'm telling you and not Victor because you'll make a lesser fuss of it."

Yuuri only gives him a knowing smile, "I'll pass the message."

Yuri flies to his room, packing his leopard printed backpack with necessities such as sunscreen and portable chargers. He shoves his swim trunks in there and sneaks out of his room when everyone is asleep, tip toeing to the kitchen and pulling out a chopping board and knife.

In the morning, Yuri tackles Otabek shuffling out of his room, bleary-eyed and yawning, with a great war cry.

"Why," Otabek moans as he lands on the floor as Yuri perches on his chest proudly. His eyes stays shut, brows pulling in, "It's too  _early_."

"You're with me for the day, you wuss," Yuri hauls him up and starts pushing him back towards his room, telling him to ditch his skates. "We're going on an adventure."

"Should I write a will beforehand?"

"Haha," Yuri growls, hustling them out and leading Otabek towards the shed. Otabek has his hands over his eyes as Yuri pulls the door open and pushes the bike out, propping it and hooking the helmets on the handles. "Okay, you can open your eyes."

Warily, Otabek lowers his hands as if he's expecting a tiger to leap out of a bush and eat him. 

"It's a Harley Davidson," Yuri is treated to a soft inhale, Otabek walking forward eagerly to inspect the bike.

"Street 750," He says smugly.

"How'd you know?" Otabek asks. "Did you ask Victor if we could skip practice today?"

"Yep, all taken care of. Denis sent over your Canadian license and I already converted it. Let's go, I don't want the heat to catch up."

Otabek sits down on the seat and tosses him a helmet, "Do you remember Barcelona?"

"The Grand Prix Final? What about it?"

Otabek turns, a slice of sun falling across his forehead and illuminating his eyes. He reaches backwards to flip down Yuri's visor, "I was riding around town on this very same bike model when I wanted to meet you back then."

Then, they race off.

 

They slow down when they reach Kiyotaki Station, Yuri critically looking at the foot traffic on the different trails as Otabek cuts the engine. Mt. Takao looms above them.

"Let's take Trail 6," Yuri says, tying his hair back as Otabek sheds his jersey. They both stretch on the sidewalk, several people looking at Yuri's neon coloured leopard muscle tee, "It has a waterfall and is mostly shaded. Takes about an hour and a half to go up, I did this trail in an hour last time."

"Sure," Otabek says, hastily closing his eyes as Yuri shoots bug spray over exposed skin. "A warning beforehand please."

The gentle slope quickly becomes a route of treacherous tree roots and rocks jutting out randomly, a perfect formula for a sprained ankle.

"Are you trying to injure me?" Otabek calls out from behind, cheeks flushed as he bends over and puts a large hand over one mossy root. "I nearly tripped ten times in the past five minutes."

"That's cuz you suck, old man," Yuri snootily replies, pushing onward. "Do you want to see the waterfall or not?"

Otabek mumbles something unintelligible, but follows Yuri.

They both fare better once they're back on flat land, walking past the shrine and little bridge before Yuri puts his arms on the wooden railing and bends forward. He sticks his feet into the little stream at the rest stop, the water cold enough that it starts feeling like his feet are burning, kicking here and there as two elderly grandmas continue to walk past them, clearly not out of breath. 

There's a sound of the camera shutter and Yuri snaps his head up, "Hey!"

"I'll send it to you later, it'll look good on your feed," Otabek says, putting his phone back in his pocket and stretching his arms out in lazy windmills. "Is this it?"

Yuri scoffs and pushes at one shoulder, "No, we're getting ramen next. Let's go!"

After lunch, Yuri tells him the instructions to the marina, before eventually throwing swim trunks at Otabek's face, pointing to the beach. Otabek squirms when he first pads out onto the hot sand, but soon relaxes and leans back on his hand as Yuri slathers sunscreen on himself.

They take over one beach umbrella, using their jerseys as pillow as they laze around and do nothing. It's so warm that Yuri floats between being unconscious and conscious, lulled by the toasty sand on his back and sea breeze on his face.

"I actually drove past you when we were in Barcelona."

Yuri opens one eye and turns his head slightly to the right, seeing the cut of Otabek's jaw as he stares out into the sea, "Really?"

"You were being stalked by your fans."

"Thanks for stopping and helping me," He sniffs, "Really nice of you to do that."

Otabek grins, "Well, at least we met. Better late than never," He digs his toes into the sand and wiggles them, "I think I have all my memories back now. I remember what happens before and after each picture in the album as well as the ones on my Instagram."

"That's good, I'm glad your memory is all back."

Otabek turns to him with a solemn expression, not saying anything, eyes just staring sadly at him like he wants to say something but there's something holding him back.

"I'm leaving in five days."

The plane ticket is burning a metaphoric hole in Yuri's pocket, "I know."

"Thank you...for doing all of this," Otabek traces shapes in the sand, "For letting me impose in your training and taking care of me these past two months."

"Hey, you sound like you don't want to continue being friends after this," Yuri jokes, wondering how the mood turned depressing so fast. 

" _Are_ we friends?"

"I took care of your whiny ass when you were sick and nearly split my skull open when you slipped in the hot springs and pulled me down! Of course we are!" He huffily says, sitting up and wiping any grains of sands sticking to his skin. "What makes you think we're not?"

"I'm not exactly someone one would see and think,  _oh, now THAT'S a champion_."

"You don't give yourself a lot of credit, don't you?"

Otabek shrugs and gets to his feet, shaking his jersey and putting an arm through one hole, eyes lowered, "It's hard to think myself as a world champion when I've spent nearly a decade admiring you," He makes eye contact with Yuri, "Do you want to know the very first thing I remembered after we crashed and I lost consciousness?" 

His throat is dry, "What is it?"

"I saw a skater with a blooming purple bruise on his right cheekbone, coming forward to my coach to ask how I was doing," Otabek crouches down on one knee now, "He looked worried, I immediately pegged that he was the one whom I collided with."

They're so close now, Yuri can see Otabek's chapped lips and the faint chicken pox scar on his temples, "And? What did you remember?"

"I remembered being in a roomful of kids who know nothing of fighting for a chance to be recognized. Then there's you, someone who looked like if you weren't extraordinary enough, you'd lose everything," Otabek bends his head down, smiling. "You still do. You're still fighting to this day."

"Hey."

"Hm?"

"You talk too much," He says lightly, before moving slightly forward and pressing Otabek's mouth against his, dragging his lips back before opening his eyes to see Otabek's expression, surprised and something fond.

"Yuri."

"What?"

"Date me."

He hums, "Funny, I'm a step ahead of you."

They lie back on the sand, wiggling closer until they could resume lazily kissing with a stretch of their neck. Otabek is everything under the sun, warm and constant. 

 

They have Denis on Skype, propped up in Yuri's arm as Minami, Yuuri and Victor stand over in a corner. Otabek skates large counters, building up speed and launching himself into the air, spinning with one arm up before executing a textbook landing.

Denis whoops, his clapping tinny sounding in the large arena as Victor cues the music and Otabek skates his short program. The triplets are eagerly watching from the sides, grinning ear to ear as Otabek slides on his knees in his step sequence, lifting himself back up before picking up speed and turning. It's very Otabek. Not a step is wasted.

Denis and Victor talk for a little bit while Nishigori lumbers out on the zamboni, smoothing the ice. Yuri doesn't have his skates on. Neither does Minami. They've given up their on-ice session today for Otabek, who's flying out tomorrow.

"Come here silly," Otabek says when Yuri peeks into his room. It's completely bare save for the backpack still open, a toiletry bag poking out of it. His luggage is neatly placed by the door and Yuri slinks into the room, watching Otabek place his photo albums in a box.

"Are you shipping it back to your sister?"

"Yeah, I have no room in my luggage and Mari offered to run it to the post office for me," Otabek writes the address in with a sharpie before capping the marker. He gives Yuri a small smile, "What do you wanna do?"

He shrugs. Otabek pulls up a Bon Iver song to play in the background, finger tracing pictures into Yuri's palm as they lie down on the futon together. 

"Try not to miss me too much."

"Too late," Yuri grumbles, "I get easily attached. Do you think Denis will lend you to me for the rest of the summer?"

Otabek pinches Yuri's cheek, "He's already nervous enough for me, I don't want to contribute to his stress. We'll see each other during competitions."

"And if we don't get the same ones?"

"You'll keep first place warm for me in the Grand Prix Final and Worlds, won't you?"

"You wish," Then, "You  _better_ be there."

"I already sat out of Worlds last year, I've hit that quota for my career."

"Good," Yuri yawns, Otabek pulling the blanket over them and slithering out to turn the lights off. "I'm going to break out into hives if JJ wins next year."

"Good thing I'll stop him," Comes Otabek's quiet reply. Yuri mumbles something incomprehensible before throwing an arm around Otabek and falling asleep.

Yuuri keeps a constant chatter throughout the ride to the airport with Victor in the front. Yuri glares at the sun high in the sky as Otabek rubs circles on the top of his hand. The lovebirds make excuses about going to the airport coffee shop, leaving Yuri with Otabek before he has to go through security.

They get udon for lunch, exchanging funny pictures on twitter and watching the vlog Phichit had put out of his time in Japan on Otabek's laptop. They watch Otabek's fanbase react with him looking well, peppering the comment section with oohs and aahs when Phichit twirls around in his yukata. Phichit tags both of them on Instagram with a fifteen second preview of his vlog. Otabek dutifully ignores his phone and continues to eat his noodles.

"Did you bring your skates?"

Yuri frowns, "Yeah, we're going straight to the rink after this," Victor insisted on him returning to the ice immediately. He hates it when Forehead is sincerely trying to help him not mope around, because he's anything but, "Why?"

Otabek shrugs off backpack and pulls his skates out, motioning Yuri to do the same and ignoring the bewildered looks people are shooting them, "Let's switch guards," He says calmly as he pulls one of his bright blue and yellow skate guards for Yuri's leopard printed ones. Otabek looks around before propping the skates on a wall and taking a quick picture on his phone, uploading it immediately onto Instagram.

"Beka?"

He speaks softly into Yuri's ears, unfolding his Team Kazakhstan jacket and sweeping it over Yuri's shoulders, "I thought you'd might want something tangible to hold in case you miss me. I know I will."

Yuri slips his arms through the holes and zips it halfway up, "I don't have my Russia one to give you."

"Then I expect a package for my birthday," Otabek says, confident. He grins, "If we're in Skate America together, you can give it to me then."

Yuri clucks his tongue, "You're dangerous."

"Putting all my effort into something usually gives me the result I want," Yuri rolls his eyes at this, "What do you think?"

He leans in and kisses Otabek's mouth, smiling into it, "I'll bring my newer one. The shoulders should fit you."

They take a final picture at the airport gate before Otabek thanks Yuuri and Victor for letting him stay at the onsen. When the intercom starts calling for the last passengers to Otabek's flight, he hugs Yuri one last time and presses a chaste kiss on his mouth before walking away.

Yuri stays until his plane takes to the skies, walking back to Yuuri as they make their way to the garage.

 

The reporters are trying very hard to keep a straight face as Seung-gil looks off to the side, unfazed and bored. Yuri gives his best smile at the front row, baring his teeth slightly. Otabek squeezes his knee below the table in warning.

Coach Denis, off to the side of the room with the other coaches, sighs as Otabek's cheeks darkens the more people stare at his Russian jersey. Yuri beams in bright blue and yellow. 

"Um," Says one brave soul from the sea of confused journalists. "Is this...a statement?"

Seung-gil takes a sip of water. Yuri laces his hands with Otabek's fingers below the table, "Yes," He lifts their hands together, "We're dating. Take your pictures and whatnot since we're going to switch jackets in five minutes. Any serious questions should be prepared, and I'll start taking the first one now."

There's one pregnant pause before the conference room turns into an uproar, and Victor shares a look with Denis, matching headaches forming.

♥  **17,895 likes  
****yuri_plisetsky**  thank you chicago! #SkateAmerica @otabek-altin  
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**Author's Note:**

> twitter @yaboyhajime


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